As video content delivery has progressed from a mass broadcast model to a more personalized narrowcast model, the modes and methods of advertising has changed accordingly. In the past, advertisers had to rely on demographic studies to determine the makeup of their advertising audience before committing large sums of money to mass broadcast and print advertising.
Already, advertisers can target their desired demographic on the web by placing ads according to user search terms and web browsing history. For example, if a user performs a search for “luxury automobiles” on a web-based search engine, the search engine will often return advertisements from luxury automobile manufactures and dealers.
With respect to video programming, some resources exist for targeted advertising also exists. As television channels and programming becomes more localized, advertisers can target their potential demographic based on program content. For example, an advertisement for a local automobile dealer can be inserted in a cable television show about automobiles at a local CATV head end. Furthermore, video-on-demand (VOD) services available at the set-top box from cable and telephony service providers, and video services available directly on the Internet, have brought with it the possibility for advertisers to directly target their desired demographic using targeted advertisements for video content. According to some market studies, targeted advertisements will account for between 40% and 60% of the total revenue for Internet protocol television (IPTV) and other Internet based video services.